Jimi Hendrix Experience Breaks Up In Denver; Jimi Booted From Army For Masturbating

The Jimi Hendrix Experience played their last show today (June 29, 1969) in Denver, Colorado. Jimi was also discharged from the Army today (June 29, 1962 – see Waxfact below.)

The group was formed when Jimi Hendrix went to London with his manager Chas Chandler.

While there, he found bandmates Noel Redding and Mitch Mitchell and form the Jimi Hendrix Experience.

The Jimi Hendrix Experience made its debut at the Monterey Pop Festival in June of 1967.

The trio produced a number of hits as a unit, including songs like”The Wind Cries Mary,” “Purple Haze,” “All Along The Watchtower” and others.

They also released three classic albums Are You Experienced, Axis: Bold As Love and Electric Ladyland, before they began to experience internal problems around April of 1969.

Jimi Hendrix

By this point in his career, Jimi Hendrix was doing acid and experimenting with depressants, which caused him to have mood swings.

He also wanted to move beyond the trio format and experiment musically.

Tensions between he and Noel Redding finally came to ahead and on June 29, 1969, Redding announced he was leaving the band.

The Jimi Hendrix Experience played its last gig at the Denver Pop Festival, where Redding announced “this is the last gig we will be playing together.”

Over 40,000 people were packed into Denver’s Mile High Stadium, amidst a tense situation between fans and police.

According to the 1978 book “‘Scuse Me While I Kiss The Sky” by Hendrix friend David Henderson, things soon broke into chaos, shortly into the group’s final set.

“As Jimi rode towards the end of the song, the crowd started rushing the stage. The police hastily assembled on the turf,” Henderson wrote. “They began firing teargas bombs into the boisterous, onrushing crowd. The wind shifted in the teargas began blowing on stage.”

Waxfact: On June 29,1962, Jimi Hendrix was approved for an honorable discharge for “unsuitability.”

Young Jimi Hendrix

While it is commonly believed that Jimi Hendrix was kicked out of the Army for homosexual activity, this in fact was not the case. Hendrix did engage in some deviant behavior though. On April 26, 1962 two of his squad members caught him masturbating.

“I looked all over the squad bay for Hendrix but couldn’t find him… I then went into the latrine and saw Hendrix sitting in the last commode,” wrote a Private named James Mattox. “I thought he was there sitting there sleeping so I stood on the stool in the commode next to his and looked into his commode, there sat Hendrix masturbating himself.”

This and other incidents led to Hendrix being discharged from the Army in June 1962.